Nigeria: Boko Haram Executes Eight Villagers For Defying “Sharia Law”

Boko Haram publicly executed eight villagers who opposed the rigorous application of Islam in northeastern Nigeria, according to a very violent video viewed by AFP.
The victims, blindfolded, are lying face down towards the ground when they are shot at point blank range by four armed and masked men. The images show a crowd that exults by attending this scene.
Just before the execution, a man wearing a white turban tells the crowd that the condemned villagers are “apostates who have abandoned Islam”.
“These people are no different from the militia fighters, spies, and Nigerian soldiers,” said the unidentified man in Hausa, one of the most widely spoken languages ​in northern Nigeria and in the Lake Chad region.
The villagers challenged the “sharia police” – members of Boko Haram who enforce a strict interpretation of Islamic law – and threatened to fight, says the man in the turban, warning that anyone who dares To defy the jihadists would know a similar fate.
There is no indication of when or where these unsustainable images were shot, but the lush vegetation seems to indicate that it was during the current rainy season.
The video shows other violent punishments including stoning to death for adultery, decapitation for drug trafficking, amputations for theft, and flogging for alcohol.
The message of Boko Haram seems to be designed to contradict the claims of the Nigerian army that jihadists are about to be defeated.
The group, which pledged allegiance to the Islamic state, had announced the creation of a caliphate at the height of its power in August 2014 after seizing large areas of land in northeastern Nigeria.
In October 2014, a similar video showed a man sentenced to death for adultery, an amputation for theft, and a couple whipped for having sex outside of marriage.
Another video aired the same month claimed to show the decapitation of an air force pilot captured after his combat aircraft was shot down.
Since the beginning of 2015, counter-insurgency operations involving troops from Nigeria and its neighbors (Cameroon, Chad, Niger) have greatly weakened the jihadist group, but the group remains active, multiplying suicide attacks and attacks against The civilian populations and the positions of the army.